No hard-drinking culture in the Commons, MPs insist

Last updated at 15:01 05 February 2007

MPs today rejected claims that there was still hard-drinking in the House of Commons. They spoke out after the widow of Fiona Jones, the former Labour MP, said the drinking culture at Westminster was partly to blame for her death.

Chris Jones, said that her death at 49 would not have happened had she not entered politics, adding, "she hardly drank at all before she was elected".

Mrs Jones became MP for Newark in 1997, as one of the Blair Babes. But she lost the seat at the following general election. In 1999 she was convicted of election fraud and faced expulsion from the House.

But on appeal her conviction was quashed. She had claimed that she was the victim of a malicious prosecution.

A number of MPs have insisted late-night and all-night sittings are now a rarity and a "sea change" in the type of person who seeks to become an MP.

Ann Winterton, Conservative MP for Congleton, commented: "There may be a drinking culture throughout the United Kingdom, but I don't believe there is one at Westminster any more.

"There is far less drinking now at Westminster than when I first came into the House 24 years ago."

Ann Widdecombe, Conservative MP for Maidstone and The Weald, agreed. "This has all changed very considerably with the change in the hours that MPs' sit.

When we used to go through to three or four o'clock in the morning, some people felt too exhausted to work beyond about one am and resorted to the tea room or the bars.

"Any drinking culture there may have been disappeared with the change in the hours."

Labour peer Lord Corbett of Castle Vale, who was a member of the House of Commons from 1974, said: "There is far less drinking than there was all those years ago, mainly because nowadays MPs do not work so late in the evening.

"Also there has been a sea-change in the type of MP we have. There are far fewer MPs now from industrial areas who, after shifting tons of coal needed a pint or three after finishing work. They brought that culture to Westminster with them."

She said at the time: "Lembit is a real party animal. He is a real barfly and there's a massive drinking culture at the House of Commons.

"I would be at home trying to sleep. He would be at reception after reception. He would say he'd be home at 11 o'clock but that would turn into four in the morning, then be up early.

"That isn't conducive to intimacy, and when somebody doesn't want to come home to you, you start asking questions," she added.

Long-serving MPs have been recalling the days when the Strangers' Bar was usually so crowded and rowdy that it was almost impossible to fight your way in. The police occasionally had to be called to break up brawls.

Nowadays, that bar has moved to a different room, sports a carpet and has been described as "an oasis of decorum".